


The Comfort Of Being Comforted

by colliquial_rain



Series: post httyd3 oneshots: all for us [2]
Category: How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Comfort, F/F, Heart-to-Heart, Multi, post httyd3
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 02:36:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25915966
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/colliquial_rain/pseuds/colliquial_rain
Summary: Heather has found that life without Windsheer has little meaning , until Astrid gives it one.alternatively;Heather needs a friend, and Astrid is willing.
Relationships: Heather & Astrid Hofferson
Series: post httyd3 oneshots: all for us [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1879918
Kudos: 2





	The Comfort Of Being Comforted

The tributary is cold between her toes. Heather wades though the water, her cotton leggings rolled up to the knee, already damp with the splash up caused by her more than reckless escapade. By her feet, a selection of fresh-water fish trapeze the bridge between them, coming up to the surface to inspect the new found ripples, and lurching out of arms length whenever she makes a sharp, sudden movement. It is a fun, simple occupant of her time. Her empty wicker basket sways in her arms.

She’s always preferred summer.

It is a pleasantly warm day; the sun hangs high and visible, a resplendent , golden bulb amongst the clear blue skies. Like honey. Sticky, and hot, and incomprehensibly tantalising. It is a pretty sight, a nice change from the greasy, rain-filled sky and thunder infestations of Berk. A latent buzz of pent up energy rolls throughout New Berk, bringing with it the saccharine-sweet song of the native island birds and the incoherent sibilation of cricket bugs. It’s good. It’s comfortable.

Heather generally melts into it.

“Hey,” Astrid calls from downstream, waving her sizeable, silver axe. It glints in the overhead sun. Casts a glare on the shimmering water, like magic. It brings a taste of nostalgia to her mouth— of silver wings and large, green eyes. Heather promptly ignores it. “I think this is good.”

They had been bored that morning. Rebuilding the huts had come to an end almost a day ago, the final one belonging to Spitelout. The viking had insisted he needed no aid, but upon realising that lumbering timber was inconceivably hard on his own — without Kingstail to bear the majority of the weight— he had scouted Heather and then, by extension, Astrid for help. And while it had been a long, and strenous task, now that there was simply nothing, Heather found herself needing more.

Something else.

Astrid had suggested apple picking. Heather had done a lot of that, recently.

“Coming.” Her response is flippant and lazy, reflecting in her languid, unhurried movements. The trees would still be there, unmoving, even if she took the route to Berk on a boat and came back several days later. She watches as Astrid rolls up the sleeves of her new tunic — her old one, the blue one, had been hung up to rest in her bedroom, too thought provoking, too attached to painful, pensive memories — the hem billowing in the wind. 

Heather watches in fascination, in bewilderment, as Astrid showcases her atheleticsm, biting her weapon into the skin of the tree and heaving upwards, until she sat amongst it’s branches. Astrid is so small, so fragile-looking, that sometimes she forgets her strength.

It never ceases to amaze her. 

“Heather,” she laments, her eyebrows furrowed. Her cheeks are pink from the sun, and the freckles on her chin are nectar-splotched, more prominent. “Are you coming or what?”

“Stop complaining.” Heather chirps. “It’s not like you’ll be going anywhere.”

Something itches in the back of her mind that neither of them will ever go anywhere ever again. 

“I might.” Astrid altercates. “So hurry up.”

She does.

They start apple picking. 

They fall into a happy rhythm. Astrid chops and Heather collects, and they listen to the running water and the faint, distant whistle of wind in the trees. Heather weakly remembers a time where the wind pulled through her braid, and the water grazed her fingertips. When she was untouchable. When she flew. 

She bites her lip.

Astrid clears her throat.

A generous silence passes them before Astrid thinks to say anything. 

“It’s okay, you know. To be be upset about it.” She says twisting the stem of an apple that was too stubborn for her liking. “I’m,” her voice wavers, “Sad too.”

Heather blinks up at her, a little startled, a little resigned, not sure whether she should speak. “It’s perfectly normal,” Astrid continues. “It’s a visceral reaction. It’s human.”

“I’m not sad,” Heather confesses, rubbing her thumb across the leathery skin of an apple. “I know I should be Astrid. But I’m not. I’m not, and I don’t know why.”

“That’s okay too. It took me a while to decide what I was. What do you want to be?”

“I want to be angry,” Heather falters. Rearranges her words. “I think I am.”

Astrid watches her friend frown. “Being angry is allowed.” 

“But it’s not fair, Astrid. I don’t deserve to be angry. Windsheer was my first friend, my first family, and she never asked for anything more than my company. I owe her everything; I owe her freedom. And I can’t even give her that without wanting more. I never deserved her.”

“You didn’t.” Astrid concurs, without any hestitation. “But she chose you. None of us deserved them. But for whatever reason, whatever motive, they stayed. And personally, I have to believe it was love.”

Heather looks down at her feet, tracing the hardy distinguable scar lines. They all had stories, memories. All which led to Windsheer. 

“Then why did she leave me?” Heather asks quietly.

Astrid drops another apple into the basket, fumbling for words. “Because she had to. She will come back Heather. I’m sure of it.”

“And if she doesn’t?”

“Well,” Astrid begins, and Heather can tell this hurts Astrid as much as it does her. “Then you have me.”

And while it wasn’t the same; wasn’t nearly enough, Heather supposed she could learn to love her too.


End file.
